2005 NASDAQ-100 Open News
By Eleanor Preston |  March 24 , 2005

The bad news from the front line of the Nasdaq-100 Open is that one of Andre Agassi’s toes is still bigger than the other one. As he set aside fears about his fitness to confirm that he will be playing his 19th tournament in Miami, Agassi also had some good news for those who would love to see him win a record seventh title there.

“It's probably only 30% bigger than my other toe now, which is a big step forward.”

Agassi underwent an MRI scan last week after he was forced to withdraw from his scheduled semi-final against Lleyton Hewitt at the Pacific Life Open (the first time in two decades he had ever pulled out of a match).  The scan showed no tendon or bone damage just, Agassi informed a wincing press room, “a tremendous amount of fluid”.

Let’s resist pus-e-footing around here (we couldn’t resist that one), for if Agassi’s foot allows him to play at his best then he has history on his racket. No-one has ever won seven Nasdaq-100 Open titles and while he hates anyone mentioning the ‘r’ word (retirement) it’s hard to imagine that he will play many more.

“I don't know if it's impressive to play that much,” he said. “I have mixed emotions on it.  Sometimes statistics hit you oddly.  That would be one of many statistics that would make me go, "Wow, I've been doing this a long time.’ It probably makes me feel more old than proud.”

Typically, he appears to remember every second of every match he has every played at the Crandon Park Tennis Center, even the ones he doesn’t particularly care to. “I came here at 16 and lost a tough five-setter to Muster on the back court 6-4 in the fifth, down two sets to Love, lost my serve at 4-5 in the fifth,” he began, before pausing for breath. “The next year I played Krickstein in the second round and had to default with cramps.  I had a first-round exit, I believe in '89, to Charlie Steeb.  1990 was real good. I lost to Edberg in the finals of Palm Springs and then beat him in the finals here.  I suppose that's when it really started.”

This year Agassi will take on young Frenchman Paul-Henri Mathieu in the second round after a bye, and will hope to give himself another reason to like a tournament which he has grown to love.

“It took me a number of years to enjoy most of the cities I travelled to, to be quite honest - especially the European cities.  It was never something that came quickly to me.  It took some years of sort of growing up to enjoy the cultures and the things they had to offer.  It was the same way here in Miami.  It wasn't a place that I responded to immediately.  But I certainly am thankful that I saw the light”

The last line was delivered with a trademark Agassi twinkle, designed to charm the locals and have everyone else sighing in appreciation of a man they know they are probably seeing the last of. He is 35 at the end of April and, if he either wins something big or wins nothing at all, he could decide to call it quits anytime before the end of this season.

Andy Roddick is some way off that and the defending Nasdaq-100 Open champion would like to keep it that way. Roddick, who takes on Fernando Verdasco on Friday, needs to defend as many ranking points as he can to stay in touch with those ahead of him in the rankings and to have any chance of making up ground on Lleyton Hewitt, who is currently No.2 ahead of him. His defense starts off with a tough match as well. Verdasco almost eliminated Roddick in the second round of the recent Pacific Life Open, but came up short in the third set losing 3-6, 6-3, 6-7 (2).

Hewitt, ironically, is absent from the Nasdaq-100 Open draw with a toe injury.

Friday’s women’s action will see the return of Justine Henin-Hardenne, who’ll be playing her first match since last year’s US Open when she takes on Abigail Spears. Henin-Hardenne’s return after her health troubles (she battled mononucleosis for much of last year only to suffer a knee injury while practicing in Sydney in January) relegates Maria Sharapova and both Williams sisters to support acts, though it’s probably best not to tell them that.

When all is said and done there may end up being only one star in Miami and his name is Andre Agassi…toes and all.

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